Wednesday, May 21, 2003
Wednesday, May 21, 2003 |
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Tamil Nadu
By Our Staff Reporter
When the petition, filed by the All-Living Beings and Environmental Protection Society, came up for hearing before a vacation bench, comprising Justice P. Sathasivam and Justice Prabha Sridevan, the senior counsel for the association, G. Masilamani, said the strike plan was called off `in the public interest'. To this, Mr. Justice Sathasivam said: "Then what happens to the sufferings of the patients for the past 15 days. Are you going to compensate them? Very unfair". However, Mr. Masilamani said even the May 14 token strike was launched not for any personal benefit of doctors; it was to attract the attention of the Government and the public to privatisation of medical education, which would dilute the standards of the profession. Privatisation would demoralise the entire profession, he said. The Additional Advocate-General, R. Muthukumaraswamy, submitted that the government doctors had been on a `partial strike' from May 10 and that they did not take up surgeries unless they were extremely urgent. As far permission for starting private colleges, he said the State Government did not have any power, barring issuance of an essentiality certificate and a no-objection certificate. The certificates were a prerequisite for starting a medical college, but even if the State Government denied them, the Centre could overrule the refusal and accord permission, Mr. Muthukumaraswamy explained.
`No negligence'
Later, the Additional Advocate-General told the Bench that there was no medical negligence, as alleged, in the death of an accident victim, P. Ilayaraja, in the Government Rajaji Hospital in Madurai on May 12, when the government doctors were on a partial strike. On May 13, a vacation Bench comprised Justice N. Dhinakar and Justice A.K. Rajan took suo motu notice of media reports on the death of Ilayaraja, allegedly caused by non-availability of doctors, and asked the Government to file a report on the circumstances which led to the death. Today, the AAG filed a report giving a clean chit to the Government doctors. According to the report, an assistant surgeon attended on the victim in the Batlagundu Government Hospital before he was shifted to the Madurai hospital in a serious condition. In Madurai also he was treated for serious head injuries, the AAG said. But by then the patient had lapsed into a coma. The Bench then posted the suo motu writ petition to the next vacation bench for further hearing on May 27. Another PIL petition, by the advocate G. Rajendran, seeking to declare that government doctors had `no legal or other right to go on strike on any other day in future on any ground' was posted for the period after vacation. The petitioner had also sought adequate protection to non-striking doctors and the general public.
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